Effect of Social Media Marketing on Hotel Industry in UK
In present scenario, Internet has become an essential medium for everyone. The major effect of Internet is on businesses that have made the organizations to connect with customers and gather information related to the buyer’s behavior. And to maintain a level of competition across the globe, companies are adopting new strategies and ideas to follow the trend of e- business. E-business allows companies to interact with customers in a particular state, country and across the globe. Social media is one of the great example of Internet services or products. Social media websites like Facebook, Twitter, etc. has made people to connect with each other regardless their geographical limitations. These social media websites has now became a medium to chat with the customer to know about their queries and feedback. Companies are using the online portals for marketing their designed products and services and also the programs of launching any new product.This trend has also got flourished in hotel industry. Hotels are using online portals to update their new schemes, prices, pictures of rooms and outside view, complementary facilities provided by them etc. This research is all about the influence of social media on Hotel Industry in UK.
Research Objectives/Aims
Research objectives give direction to dissertation and are critical for any kind of research. Following are the objectives of the research work:
- To analyze the changes brought in hotel industry due to Internet and its services.
- To have assessment of the main activities of social media marketing.
- To study the role of social media marketing in the context of hotel marketing and its strategies.
- To analyze the effect of social media marketing on hotels and analyze the challenges of social media marketing.
Hypothesis
- UK ranks at the top in the whole globe providing hospitality services.
- Social media act as an essential medium for the hotels to connect with their customers.
Literature Review
Social media plays an important role in planning marketing strategies for hotels. Social media facilitates two way communications where hotels can communicate with customers about their need and can get feedback from their side. Traditionally, hotels used to do marketing through different types of advertisements where marketing used to be done through images of the property, food etc. This this type of marketing couldn’t be used to target wider customers particularly abroad and was limited to only particular group of clients. To cope with such issues social media marketing was adopted. Social media makes hoteliers to reach maximum number of customers beyond the geographical limitations. It has been estimated that approx. 2.1 million of people use social media on everyday basis for variety of purposes. And out of such purposes some people also use social media to share or posters their pictures with hotels and read reviews when they check-in the hotels.
Research Methodology
Research methodology forms an important step to fulfil the need of dissertation. In this, the researcher collects important data in order to prove the topic of study and its validity. The researcher can use qualitative methodology in which he or she can conduct surveys to know about the viewpoint of different customers. The researcher can carry out interviews with marketing heads of any two selected premier hotels of UK and also with consumers of UK to know about their views and to judge whether they use social media to post and read reviews about the hotels property. Inductive research can also be followed to conclude the study. Following are the sample of questions that the researcher can follow:
- What changes has been brought in hotel industry after the introduction of Internet and technology?
- What activities actually define or included in social media marketing?
- What role does social media marketing play in hotel industry marketing?
- What are the challenges that comfort hotel due to the use of social media marketing and how does it affects the marketing of hotels?
A small sample size was selected in which survey was conducted on 100 consumers of UK falling under the age of 18 to 45 years. The observations from the survey follow as:
| Experience Type | Percent of people(%) |
| Good | 60 |
| Intermediate | 20 |
| Poor or Bad | 20 |
Fig1:EXPERIENCE OF CONSUMERS WITH HOTELS
Conclusion
Social media marketing is one of the best strategies that the hoteliers follow to increase their visibility and clientele.There are number of social media websites and it has been estimated that 2010 there were around 500 million plus users of Facebook and Twitter had 75 million active users in the same year. These users can be students who are using social media websites for their fun, business professionals and many more. Considering the advantages of social media, it is one of best tools in the field of marketing.
References
Ronnestam, J. (2010). 3 SOCIAL MEDIA MODELS THAT WILL GUIDE YOUR BRAND INTO THE CONVERSATION LANDSCAPE. http://www.ronnestam.com/3-models-guide-your-brand-succesful-social-media-strategy/ .Accessed on 15th July, 2015.
Korosuo, S. (2013). Social media as a marketing tool for extreme-sport oriented companies. http://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:631004/fulltext01.pdf .Accessed on 15th July, 2015.
Camaide, M. (2013).THE MATURITY MODEL SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING.AT INTERNET / WHITE PAPER.Accessed on 15th July, 2015.
Dev, S. (2013).Must Read: 6C’s of Social Media Marketing. http://blog.digitalinsights.in/6cs-of-social-media-marketing/0578487.html .Accessed on 15th July, 2015.
Harihar, A. (2013). Social Media Strategy Review: Hospitality Industry. http://www.socialsamosa.com/2013/10/social-media-strategy-review-hospitality-industry/. Accessed on 15th July, 2015.